Chapter 27 #2
Over the next two days, we collect invoices and receipts, boxing up anything and everything we think might be important for a final tax statement. Lumi will store the boxes in her garage.
As we dig through file cabinets, we uncover memory after memory. Old titles for the property. Blueprints for the garage. Original receipts from a time long gone. Black and white photographs stuffed between ancient tax bills.
I don’t want to part with a thing, and I wish I had space for the metal office desk. Heck, I’d even settle for an orange plastic waiting room chair. But my house is only so big and already furnished.
Instead, I take a few tools. Those original blueprints. A set of crescent wrenches I’ll never use. A rusty welding mask and Dad’s uniform shirt. The one that hung on the back of the office door.
The items hardly fill a box. Sixty-something years of business reduced to a small collection of trinkets.
My sad is sad, and I’m so emotionally exhausted by the end of day two, I don’t take Saint and Lumi up on their offer to grab dinner together.
I just want to shower and climb into bed, which is exactly what I do, wearing the flannel shirt Tate gave me only yesterday morning. Curled on my side, pillow between my knees, I stare at the dark wall in my bedroom.
Tate sent me texts over the past two days and even called me last night, but I let it go to voicemail.
Yesterday, I responded, telling him I was tired, and I planned to go to bed early. The excuse was lame as I tossed and turned, Little Wrench deciding it was soccer practice time. Didn’t matter because my mind was like a ball being kicked all over an empty field.
Tate. Dad. The garage. The baby.
What am I going to do in the future?
I’m too exhausted to think about tomorrow. Or the next day. And I used the same excuse tonight—tired, early to bed—to avoid seeing Tate.
My eyes finally close. My body sinks into the mattress. When a light tapping comes to my front door. I’ve fallen into the weightiness of heavy dozing, where I’m conscious of things outside of me, but too foggy and lethargic to move, so I hope whoever it is will go away.
Then, I hear the doorknob twist and the soft call of my name. I still don’t answer, deciding I’m dreaming.
Tate couldn’t possibly be letting himself into my house. Finding the spare key I not so discreetly keep under a planter next to the front door. He isn’t standing beside my bed, whispering my name again, then crawling on it, and scooting up behind me, lining his body up along mine.
Chest to my back. Knees behind mine. Feet beneath my feet. He spreads his palm wide and runs it over my belly, settling it there.
“Neve,” he whispers one more time, his chin on my shoulder.
“I’m sleeping,” I whisper-groan.
He smiles into my neck. “I just wanted to make sure you were okay.”
Am I okay? I just emptied out my dad’s garage. It feels like he died all over again. We cleared out his house shortly after he passed and sold the place. The garage had even more sentimental value than the house did.
“It’s okay to not be okay,” he whispers against my skin, like he gets it on some level. Acknowledging that I might not be as okay as I pretend to be.
“I’m good,” I lie, not certain why I can’t tell him the truth. I’m frightened and feel alone. And I’m having a baby, and there is no guide for that. I don’t know how to mother. I don’t even know how to take care of myself most days.
“You don’t have to be good all the time either.” He reiterates, nuzzling his nose against my neck before settling in behind me. Holding me, allowing the silence that follows.
The weight of his arm around me is a comfort I’ve never known but appreciate more than I can express.
His body lined up behind me, holding me tight against him, brings further confirmation that I don’t need to be okay, and Tate will still be here.
My emotions are not imperfections. He accepts me as I am.
A little worn out. A little battered feeling. A lot confused.
The silence continues, and I drift back into that hazy sensation of sleep-but-not-sleep. Just drifting like my life feels like at the moment.
I’m not certain how much time passes before he runs his hand down my arm. “I like seeing you in my shirt,” he says just below my ear, tickling my neck.
I hum. I don’t want to admit how much I like wearing his shirt.
This is the second night in a row I put it on after showering, breathing in the scent of him embedded in the soft material.
Spice and clove. Sexy and comforting. Wearing his shirt strangely made me feel .
. . safe. Like everything would be okay.
Not today. And maybe not tomorrow. But soon.
Tate presses another kiss into my neck and slowly pulls his hand back over my belly. “I’ll let you sleep.”
I catch his hand before he meets my hip. Clutching at the back of it, I keep my eyes closed, but my voice is strong. “Tate.”
He stills behind me.
“Do you think you could stay awhile?” I pause and lick my lips, lowering my voice. “Maybe hold me for a little bit longer.”
“Of course, baby,” he coos.
I hear the distinct thud of shoes falling to the floor and feel a rustling shift behind me again before Tate lines up against me once more. He slips his hand over my stomach, and I cover the back of it, feeling like he’s holding onto Little Wrench more than me.
Selfish, I know.
But I drift off to sleep when his arm grows heavier, and his hand never leaves my belly.